So what would be the use? To get some worthless flags and progression that doesn't really make a difference? Why wouldn't you just keep your alts or create an alt? If you have a shaman alt, you can camp it where you are and log in to buff the group, then your main back. If you had a shaman persona, you would have to take your main to a fast camp zone, switch, get your shaman back to your group, buff, then back to a fast camp zone, then get your main back there lol. Wow, can't wait for that!! It's worthless if you can't switch in any zone and it's one of the coolest additions to EQ if you can, it's that big of a difference.
Certainly there are benefits to personas even if they are fast-camp swap only. However, those benefits need to be weighed against the development cost. This feature isn't free to develop and it won't be free to support in the future. It is a complex feature to implement and will likely have complicated issues which will make support challenging. Is there going to be sufficient return on investment to justify personas? If a lot of people use it, then that means a lot of people will get more enjoyment from EQ, play it more, and spend more on it. But if they are just used in edge cases by a small part of the players, then it's going to be a costly feature for little gain. The handful of people who use it will enjoy it, but their enjoyment won't translate into enough additional revenue to justify the development cost and the cost of ongoing support of personas. If it's fast-camp zone only, then it's hard to see how the feature creates enough revenue to justify its existence. I would tend to think that given the choice between these two options: * Additional raids and group content * Personas where you can only switch in fast-camp zones A majority of players would prefer to have more content rather than personas where you can only switch in fast-camp zones. I would think more content would generate more expansion sales and ongoing revenue compared to the limited use persona.
It doesn't have a lot of uses for Live servers. It's marketed towards TLPs where flagging for raids is a huge hurdle to go through. The slayer achievements and heroic vitality stats and what not are a nice boon for leveling a lower level character but negligible once maxed at 120. On TLPs being able to skip flagging and just worry about leveling/gearing an alt is a major time saver
They probably do exist just to get TLP people to buy the xpac(or the feature separately afterwards), yes. Very few if any live players are going to skip on the expansion with or without APs.
Personas is awesome for those who start over at level 1 on a TLP. As someone mentioned earlier/elsewhere, it is also nice for those who want to main change but don't want to spend time redoing slayer, progression, TS etc. The question is, how many people on Live servers want to do personas? Only time will tell.
Here's something that hasn't been thought about. A benefit to db. Did ppl stop buying dolls for alts? Is this a way to not have to add database space for new names? Is this a way to not have to add space for more char slots? Chars are under the "umbrella" of one name, one database slot. Yes it does create a vast amount of other problems, but it may solve others from a database perspective with old code. There is also a side benefit of new players who can't get a group because lower lvls aren't being played. They do exist, I was talking to one a few days ago over a turkeyfest and their frustration.
That's why the other personas are different classes. You never have all the abilities at once. If you want the other abilities, you swap personas. People already do this with alts/boxes. As the ads for the feature said "Switch classes faster". This ability is expressly what it was advertised to be.
Sure, if you take it out of context: The advertisement does not imply it was meant to give your character on-demand access to abilities it would otherwise not have. The advertisement lists things that would benefit from being able to swap between multiple classes on one character. If it was meant for you to leave combat and swap to a rogue to stealth past enemies, it would have been touted as a feature, yes?
On the flip side , if it’s less useful than an alt why spend all that time leveling an ap. I know there are some benefits but being able to switch when out of combat would be the most useful to me. It would be nice to be able to switch from a tank to a healer or utility when needed but I don’t want to have to go back to town then run to the instance on the other character at that point I may as well use a box. Then again I play on fv so stuff is more tradeable and I have a bunch of boxes as it is. Having to go back to town on a tlp is even more of a deal breaker over an alt because of travel time. Again I think it would be a great feature on a tlp server but if I’m going to drop my tank to switch to my healer or enchanter persona but I have to run that persona from a starting city it kinda makes the feature meh. It already has negatives where you share a lockout with the other personas.
Maybe the issue isn't APs but the fact that they've progressively removed everything that makes APs appealing on TLPs but not appealing on live?
I am absolutely psyched for ap's. As a warrior I can't wait to group as a paladin/sk and get use to other tanks tool sets without having to camp a million augs/chase items/slayers etc. visible gear and weapons? Easy enough
You and I will never agree on how the advertising for this feature was meant to be taken. Probably best we just drop it.
Because I quoted the actual advertising material? At any point did they say this would provide a tangible benefit for your current persona? I'm not being rude here, if they did then I'll agree. As far as I can see, people read intentions into this that never existed.
Yes, you can swap classes by logging into an alt. This does it faster. Does stealthing past enemies on an alt rogue put your main past the enemies?
By using the feature? They're saying they'll be able to put in the meager amount of time it will take to level/AA/get visibles and weapons and then be able to play as a knight when they feel like it. All of the other "stuff" like augs, tradeskills, slayer, and chase items will already be done by virtue of it being a persona. And that other "stuff" takes an order of magnitude more time than doing levels and AA. It's the primary thing that prevents people who care about their performance from wanting to play alts or reroll. That stuff is important, and it takes ages. Now they don't have to redo any of it.
